Out of the house

Getting out of the house is hard these days! With alternating nap schedules, 3 year old fits and rarely getting a moment to shower, we have just stayed home A LOT! I realized that my Children's museum membership expires at the end of the year and we haven't used it much since Miles was born. We wanted to get a couple more outings in.  Our outing went exceptionally smooth. Charlie was much better at staying with me. (he's notorious for running towards whatever catches his eye.) Miles was content to be in the stroller when I needed him to be and happy when it was time to get out and play. Charlie was even being an exceptional listener when it was time to stop to go to the bathroom and stop for lunch. Such a tender mercy.  Anyway, here are some phone photos from our very successful outing.

Zoo Lights!

Last night we made our way to Zoo Lights! We've been wanting to go for a couple years now but we finally did it this year, when Charlie could more fully appreciate it. I haven't been since I was a kid and Max's last time he went was right when he got home from his mission. We planned to go last Thursday but there was a massive wind storm that knocked some lights out and the whole Zoo was shut down. So we went on Monday and it was BUSY! We lucked out and found a close parking spot but then we stood in a long line to get into the zoo. We met up with our wonderful friends, The Hodsons who finally came back after being away for internships. We finally got in and walked around the zoo admiring the lights. It was pretty cold but still above freezing. It was fun seeing Charlie and Madeleine running around enjoying the lights. 

For the first 15 minutes we were in ther zoo, Charlie was talking about the train and  how he wanted to ride it. There was a  2 hour wait so it was not worth waiting in line to ride the train for 8 minutes then go home. Luckily Charlie didn't dwell on the train and was excited to see everything else and touch all the lights.  And oh yeah, I wasn't really sure how to work my camera in this lighting so I got  a bunch of blurry practice.

Our family!

The Hodsons

I love these boys!

Charlie is happy to have his best friend back! 

The jungle

Enthralled with the lit carousel.

Madeleine protecting her baby sister!

And then we saw the elephants, the only live animal we saw in the whole zoo.

Miles was so calm the whole time which was refreshing because he was a screamer on the car ride both ways.

It was a fun outing and we were happy to have some family time and spend time with our good friends.We're not sure if this will be a yearly tradition as standing in lines and pushing through crowds in the cold are not the most fun, but we will probably go again some time

Rub a dub dub

We have an abandoned bath tub in our house. It doesn't have walls and you have to use a wrench to turn it on so it doesn't get much use. We decided that we would finally get some use out of it and get two little boys clean at the same time. (They usually bathe in our huge utility sink or the shower in case you were worried about our children's hygiene) And of course this event needed to be documented..so here you go!

Oh man, these boys love water and can't wait for their next time in the big bath!

8 Months

And here are the MILEStones (see what I did there?) for 8 months.

Speed crawler
4 huge teeth
Lots of giggles
Bald Bald Bald!
Much Improved naps. 1.5-3 hours at a time :)
Waking once per night
Eating solids. Grabbing puffs and putting them in his mouth.
Climbing up on everything and sometimes leaning on his hip so he can stand and hold a toy with both hands.
H can get himself down from standing too which make me happy that he's not standing up and crying in his bed because he can't get down.

As traumatizing as it is for me, the crawling has made Miles a lot happier He can crawl around the living room for a long time and be totally entertained while I get other things done.

He likes to follow me through the house. If I run upstairs for something he crawls to the stairs, I've only seen him go up one stair so far and I haven't left him there to see if he would go up anymore. We'll have to put up the baby gate soon I think.

Also, if he bonks his head on something he will crawl toward me for comfort, usually in his journey towards me, he forgets that he's hurt and starts playing with whatever he finds.

He is switching from his beat up old pack in play into his crib this week. That was his Christmas gift. No more lumpy hard mattress for him.

I like that he's more sturdy and Charlie can play with him but Charlie doesn't seem to like Miles' mobility as he is always encroaching in Charlie's business.

We roamed the Library to celebrate Miles turning 8 months (and to return our overdue books) He loved roaming free.

Photo dump time

I've been so scattered that Thanksgiving and Christmas decorating are all becoming part of this photo dump post but it is what it is. 

When Miles naps, this is what Charlie and I do....there are so many leaves and this is before even half of them had fallen. 

Then there are the times when Miles is awake.

The Monday before Thanksgiving, we pulled out the Christmas decorations and trimmed the tree.  The boys were the most excited about the box

I know a lot of these photos have ended up blurry recently but I really have been trying harder to capture memories and not take perfect photos...(assuming I have ever taken a perfect photo...haha)

Then there was a day when I loaded up the boys to go do piano lessons at my student's house. It was 5pm and Charlie fell asleep on the way, I carried him in and laid him on a chair. He slept during the whole lesson. When we were done I carried him back to the car and he slept the whole way home. I thought it might be my chance to get a photo of him sleeping under the tree just like HERE. He woke up right after I set him down but this is what I got.

I took ZERO photos during our Thanksgiving festivities. SO I will briefly summarize what we did. Max got a 4-day weekend which was pretty wonderful! Thanksgiving day, he left in the morning to go play football with the men from church. When he got back we went out as a family to rake and blow leaves and fill the yard debris. We then came in, Miles had a nap and I got in a great pre-dinner workout. After getting ready, we went to my Red Grandma's house shortly before 4pm and feasted. We decided to simpify our lives and not try to visit everyone and eat everywhere. So we only went to my Red Grandma's on Thanksgiving day and to Max's family get together the next day. In the past, we've had up to 4 Thanksgiving dinners. Yikes. We enjoyed spending a long morning and afternoon at home together on Thanksgiving day. We had fun at Red Grandmas house and watched some football and Charlie ran around playing shoot 'em up games with my cousins.

The next morning the boys slept in a bit which was great and refreshing. Max worked on the property for awhile and Charlie and I made rolls. We then got ready to go to Max's Unlce Jays house. We got there right in time for dinner. We had fun eating then the tables were cleared and all the boys just went at it in a massive wrestling match. It got intense but it was fun for Charlie to be involved in the tradition for the first time. It is one of Max's favorite memories.

On Saturday, Max and I had a lot of projects we wanted to get done around the house. So we invited his parents over to play with the boys while we cleaned the gutters and I put Christmas lights up on our house. Max wouldn't let me put lights up last years because he didn't want me on the roof being all pregnant. Haha, Now I wish people will actually see our house, but you wil never see it unless you come over...or if I take a picture.

Then there was the day that a huge snowstorm was expected, school was canceled, roads were closed and we barely got a mist of snow and ice. Haha. 

And I decided to take Charlie to go get his first real haircut. I'm still deciding if it was worth it. I think Max can cut his hair just as well. But Charlie had a good time. 

Yes these photos are out of order but we were testing which lights would work for the house.

Another attempt at making potty training fun. He is getting so close. He didn't really get the idea of the sticker chart though, he kept taking the stickers off. I'm hoping by the end of the year he will be mostly trained minus bedtime. It is one of our 2014 goals

Then we had a family outing to the pool since Max didn't get to go with us on Charlie's birthday. This is the only photo we took. Miles was so calm and content the whole outing and these chairs are so funny.

For one of our Thanksgiving dinners I decided to curl my hair and Charlie wanted to try out the curlers.

Miles starts "under the tree" photos.

Then this happened to my hair.

We've been practicing a lot of things on our white board. Here Charlie was working on the letter B. He's been doing really well with A so we decided to move on. 

Charlie talks about the Elders and Missionaries a lot so we decided to pull out a bunch of our mission stuff for family night and talk to him about our missions.

And then there are the everyday things like playing under a blanket with your brother and a flashlight.